1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technique for linking a plurality of objects. More particularly, the present invention relates to an object linkage system, an object linkage method and a computer readable recording medium storing a program for efficiently linking related objects with each other to enable an information processing apparatus to process the linked objects.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are many different kinds of objects in a work environment. For example, as these objects, there are a schedule, an event, a meeting, a document, a forum, a workflow, a calendar, and a project. Each object includes its contents and metadata in which the object is described for easy searching. For example, as to a schedule object, its metadata includes “heading”, “person in charge” and “deadline”. As to an event object, its metadata includes “heading”, “place” and “date and time”. As to a meeting object, its metadata includes “participant” in addition to the metadata (“heading”, “place” and “date and time”) of the event object.
Typically, the above-mentioned different kinds of objects are handled by different systems. For example, a calendar (scheduler) system processes the schedule, event and meeting objects, a system related to documents/contents processes the document object, a discussion aid system (chat system) processes the forum object, and a workflow system processes the workflow object. Further, a project management system processes the project object.
On the other hand, each system can be also used for processing metadata/contents of the object handled by the system. However, most systems do not have a capability for processing metadata/contents of an object processed in a different system. For example, the calendar (scheduler) system handles entries on the meeting object, but the calendar system cannot be used for changing a participant list in minutes of a corresponding meeting. The participant list needs to be handled by the document management system.
Systems in which cooperative work is performed among a plurality of users have been proposed in the past. For example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2005-346199 discloses an information editing apparatus for saving time and effort for inputting information. The disclosed information editing apparatus includes a table update unit for updating registration information in accordance with agreement/disagreement between input title and stored title using a related table that stores schedule titles. In addition, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2005-352730 discloses an information processing apparatus for executing an application using an intuitive operation. The disclosed information processing apparatus detects a category of a selected character string to display information, specified by the character string, corresponding to the category. Further, Japanese Patent No. 3547159 discloses a cooperative work aid system including a plurality of computer systems providing cooperative work areas on display screens. The disclosed cooperative work aid system provides cooperative work areas corresponding to characteristics of business.
However, in the above-mentioned techniques, many systems handling different kinds of objects are independent from each other. Thus, even though objects handled by different systems are related with each other, the related objects cannot be linked with each other. More particularly, although the document management system stores meeting minutes of particular meetings, the meeting minutes are not linked with corresponding meeting entries in the calendar (scheduler) system.
So, there has been no conventional technique, based on a computer system, for accessing the meeting minutes from the calendar system or for accessing meeting entries from the document management system, or the like. Thus, in conventional techniques, it takes time and requires manual work to access related objects in different systems.
In addition, even though an object in a system is connected with a related object in a different system, there has been no technique for reflecting changes applied to the object in the related object of the different system, that is, there has been no technique for linking the object with the related object in the different system. As an example for this, a case is considered in which a Gantt chart of a project activity in a project management system is connected with a presentation document processed by a document management system for discussion in a meeting. Even though the Gantt chart is changed as a result of the discussion, there is no system based technique for reflecting the change in the project management system. Thus, it requires not only time but also interactive operations to reflect changes of the object in a related object in a different system, which tends to cause mistakes.
In addition to that, even if changes applied to an object in a system are reflected in a related object in a different system using a conventional manual method, it takes time to perform switching between two systems since the two systems are independent from each other, and two objects cannot be synchronized with each other in real time. Thus, these two objects are recognized and operated sequentially in a conventional technique.
As to this problem, a case can be taken as an example in which a user is watching a Gantt chart of a project activity using a project management system, and another user is watching a presentation including a copy of the Gantt chart using a document management system. In this case, when a user changes the Gantt chart, another user instantly watches a version of a Gantt chart which is not the newest one, and the other user does not know that the Gantt chart is not the newest. Also, the user who changed the Gantt chart does not become aware that the other user is watching the old version at the same time using a different system.
As a result, it is realistically impossible for users to maintain synchronization between related objects in different systems with reliability.
That is, an object of the present invention is to provide an object linkage system, an object linkage method and a computer readable recording medium storing a program for efficiently linking related objects such that the related objects can be processed in an information processing apparatus.